Mayo councillor fears serious accident will occur at Achill bridges

AN Achill councillor fears that a serious accident will have to occur before Mayo County Council prioritises replacing three bridges along a dangerous stretch of road in the centre of the island.

Achill-based councillor Paul McNamara raised his concerns at the monthly meeting of the Westport/Belmullet Municipal District where he once again called for the three bridges to be replaced as they are too narrow for traffic to pass safely.

The three bridges are located within a short distance of each other along the R319 at the entrance to the village of Cashel. A number of accidents have occurred along the road and the bridges have been hit a number of times and stones displaced.

The issue has been raised a number of times by Cllr McNamara who has called for the bridges to be replaced but he was informed that it is not yet a priority on the council's list of projects.

Speaking at the monthly meeting, Cllr McNamara said that he fears that a serious accident will occur before any work is done to make the location safe.

“I got an email from the local garda station where they outlined all the times they were called to accidents at that spot and it is only a matter of time before there is a serious accident unless something happens. People who know the area give way to the traffic but for tourists visiting the area they think two cars can pass or a camper van and car will pass on the bridge and an accident occurs. The bridge has several chunks taken out of it at the moment.

“In my opinion it is only a matter of time before there is a serious accident and that is when everything is done. We have seen down in Dugort when a gentleman unfortunately lost his life in flash flooding and all of a sudden everything which could be in place was up but it was too late for that gentleman. To me the same thing will happen in Cashel.

“There will be a serious accident in Cashel and somebody will get seriously hurt. It is an 80 km speed limit and two cars crashing at 80 km per hour it is inevitable we will have a fatality. I can guarantee you then we will have a new bridge within 12 months. We will have everyone with a yellow jacket from here to Dublin on the side of the road but it will be too late,” he warned.

In response, Padraig Walsh, Head of the Municipal District said the replacement of the three bridges will not make the location safe and this requires a realignment and widening of the road at the bridges. He said there are a number of projects around the county which also need funding and the Achill project will have to take its place on the list.

“If we have funding available we would be happy to progress to design and tender of that immediately but the reality is we don't until it gets higher up the list,” Mr Walsh explained.

“I will emphasise the importance of this to him [Head of Roads, Paul Dolan] but the bridges you are talking about need the bridge deck to be extended and new parapets put on so the carriageways are wider and the road in between is aligned. It is a project of significant scale but all I can do is emphasise the importance of it to the head of roads,” he added.

Cllr McNamara expressed frustration that the project is not yet on the list of priorities and called for someone to 'lift the pen to bring it to design stage to apply for funding'.